Tag Archives: death

When I first grabbed this book, the color stood out to me on the New shelf. I read the inside cover, and it sounded like a good read. I wasn’t disappointed. I love reading good books with a lot of music involved.

The Falling Between Us is a story about Joshua Blackbird, a boy from a small town who becomes famous with YouTube. At first, I was getting a Justin Bieber vibe from it. The story is told from the perspective of Roxanne Stewart, who is his best friend and ex-girlfriend. She’s been on tour with him. But the fame isn’t all fun and games, and the glamour of what it looks like.

Joshua starts having to deal with the bad side of fame. Between the crazy fans and paparazzi, the evil family and management, and his “girlfriend” for the press, who can he trust? Roxanne met him when she was six, but didn’t really meet him until their 9th grade English class. Now, Roxanne and Joshua’s drummer, Speed, are his only two true friends.

One night on a boat, Joshua swims off and after a long search, is announced dead. Roxanne is devastated. Is she able to piece all the clues together before it’s too late?

This isn’t your typically story of when a teenager becomes famous and gets tired of it. I would have to say that some parts of the ending were not written well, but overall this was a good read. For the second book by author Ash Parsons, I wasn’t disappointed.

When Breath Becomes Air is a best selling book written by author Paul Kalanithi, who majored in English literature in Stanford and would get his Masters degree in English literature. He would enter medical school in Yale and at 36 years old, he would become a resident neuroscientist and neurosurgeon. His life had full of hope and would seem to blossom with his wife Lucy. However, he was diagnosed with stage four metastatic lung cancer. His future seemed to be gone, and it looked as though his potential wouldn’t come to fruition.

Paul had learned about life and death throughout his studies in literature and philosophy. He would learn about death through the experience of studying medicine, but it was a whole new experience when death seemed to come to him. His short term and long term plan for his life would have to be revised. In the hospital, the doctor was somewhat like the “captain” of the ship, and Paul had always been the doctor, the captain, the leader. Suddenly, he became the patient, the ship, the follower. He was confused about his identity. However, he would choose to be a leader and captain of his own life. He spent time with his family, he would write his book When Breath Becomes Air, returned to the hospital, took care of patients, and would even have a daughter. He would leave this unfinished memoir behind and leave a lesson to us that we are all going to die someday, but we have to continue living our lives and making the most of it.

Jesse Aarons lives in a big family with four sisters and being the only boy pulls him down sometimes. But he never would have imagined that there would be a girl named Leslie Burke beating him in a foot race, becoming his class’ fastest runner. His confession of this fact led to the starting point of their relationships as chums.

As friends, Leslie and Jesse create an imaginary place to hide from the troubles of the world. There is a narrow rivulet in between the two worlds, sometimes when it’s raining the water roared and raved its intensity with the thunder and the rainwater never really got mollified. During sunny days, the singing water just lets it’s tender skirt trickle along the moist shore, showing happiness and relaxation with the caressing of the soothing sunlight. A decrepit rope connected the two of them as they created an imaginary bridge to the Kingdom Of Terabithia.

There were fewer things in the modern society compared to this magical kingdom. Ogres, fairies, and trees that can extend its flexible branches and help people are components that fall under this natural shield. The first thing after school isn’t homework anymore, but to implement their duty as queen and king to patrol in their own kingdom with the guard dog Prince, Jess and Leslie were inseparable.

It wasn’t until when Jess’s dream came true that he went to this art museum with his music teacher Ms. Edmunds, unaware that tragedy strikes while he is away. A miracle could happen, only so that Jess could be salvaged immediately from the interminable guilt.